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When it matters most: Collaboration between first responders in incidents and exercises
Author(s) -
Kristiansen Elsa,
Johansen Fredrik Håland,
Carlström Eric
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
journal of contingencies and crisis management
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.007
H-Index - 51
eISSN - 1468-5973
pISSN - 0966-0879
DOI - 10.1111/1468-5973.12235
Subject(s) - ambiguity , active listening , work (physics) , public relations , suicide prevention , human factors and ergonomics , psychology , applied psychology , poison control , engineering , political science , medicine , medical emergency , computer science , mechanical engineering , communication , programming language
Inter‐organizational collaboration is increasingly a topic for studies into accidents and disasters as well as exercises. In this study, which is based on interviews with first responders, we compared perceived collaboration during an exercise with crisis work. The three organizations included in this study—fire department, police and ambulance services—perceived the investigated tunnel exercise completely different, ranging from harmonious interaction to power struggles between commanding officers, fragmented decision‐making and ambiguity. When comparing the exercise with an incident, we found that collaboration was more evident during incidents than in exercises. However, collaboration exercises appear to improve inter‐organizational collaboration by stimulating informal structures, practicing listening and delegating, getting to know one another and learning a common language.